Zf Heat Exchanger Replacement

[SuckSqueezeBangBlow]

I swapped out the heat exchanger and replaced it with the Territory / R-spec version. It is the same, except slightly thicker.

you can do this in your garage, on the floor.

I removed the passenger front wheel, and jacked up the car.

Here is the ZF heat exchanger. People have been reporting failures, meaning they notice their coolant overflow bottle getting sludgy with oil, which also means the gearbox gets coolant in it. For $196 (retail) you can buy the bigger version or $139 for the stock one. Or you can wait until it fails and rebuild your gearbox and replace it then. My car is now 4 years old and has 50,000kms so I'd rather do it now for peace of mind.

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Connecting to the heat exchanger is a "coolant junction", which I think is called a Bypass Valve. These have been superseded because they leak.

Mine leaks.

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The part that has replaced the black plastic junction is a one piece pipe, with two new hoses.

I'm going to use a hoist to swap the new pipe work in, and hope like hell I don't have to remove the inlet manifold.

To swap the heat exchanger is straight forward, the coolant hoses have hose clamps, and the ZF lines have push-pull connectors.

There are two bolts to remove and that's it.

Here is the new one in.

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[IBOO57]

Thanks for showing that I will get a new heat exchanger myself.

Ill have to check if mine has that coolant junction but I guess it will.

Does it say KTM (as in motorbikes) on the side of the heat exchanger?

Oh and did you lose much Transmission fluid when you disconnected the lines?

Edited 02/01/11 03:14 AM by IBOO57

[kyle173]

wat one does a fg have on it r spec/ terrioty or a standard one?

[Pazzo]

yes it does say ktm, ktm use them on there 990 dakar bikes. work mate has one on his 990. could not belive it when I saw that aswell, and at a ktm dealer lot more than $139.

[SuckSqueezeBangBlow]

Does it say KTM (as in motorbikes) on the side of the heat exchanger?

Oh and did you lose much Transmission fluid when you disconnected the lines?

yep, KTM.

no, not much fluid lost - less than cup, went for a drive and its shifting the same.

however, I'm going to do another service fill of the box next week anyway.

wat one does a fg have on it r spec/ terrioty or a standard one?

sorry mate no idea.

also, I'm only going by what the ford parts guy said when he looked it up on his computer in that the r-spec and territory one are the same. if someone else could confirm it to be true or BS that would be good.

[JETURBO]

for the effort of changing this to a r spec one why didnt u just go a trans cooler and be done with the coolant lines period?

[SuckSqueezeBangBlow]

maybe next time its due for a change I'll put an air-to-air cooler up behind the fog light - was that your setup I saw?

I guess I kept reading about how the ZF doesn't like them, and no one could confirm that a standard tranny cooler would work.

what I've done here is preventative maintenance, not a performance mod at all.

[F6turbo]

So apart from getting rid of that junction in the piping the heat exchange itself is the same just slightly bigger? The same chance of getting the two fluids mixed is there or is this new one a lot better in that regard? A few guys have just the external coolers set up with good results, totally eliminating the possibility of coolant and trans fluid mixing.

[SuckSqueezeBangBlow]

I'm guessing they fail over time due to corrosion of poor alloy, so a new one should give you a few years hopefully.

yes a normal external tranny cooler would be better and should last longer.

hopefully someone can link to a setup that is known to work with confirmation of no funny business from the 'box.

[ScatterBrain]

Well I've been running a stand alone air cooler on my ZF for about 7-8 months now, I haven't had any problems form the box. I keeps the trans nice and cool, the highest temp I've seen is 90c and that was at QR.